OF Watt, the genius, possessed of abilities far beyond
those of other men, a scientist and philosopher, a mechanician and a
craftsman, one who gravitated without effort to the top of every society,
and who, even when a young workman, made his workshop the meeting-place of
the leaders of Glasgow University for the interchange of views upon the
highest and most abstruse subjects—with all this we have already dealt, but
it is only part, and not the nobler part. He excelled all his fellows in
knowledge, but there is much beyond mere knowledge in man. Strip Watt of all
those commanding talents that brought him primacy without effort, for no man
ever avoided precedence more persistently than he, and the question still
remains: what manner of man was he, as man? Surely our readers would esteem
the task but half done that revealed only what was unusual in Watt's head.
What of his heart? is naturally asked. We hasten to record that in the
domain of the personal graces and virtues, we have evidence of his
excellence as copious and assured as for his pre-eminence in invention and
discovery.
We cite the testimony of those who knew him best. It is
seldom that a great man is so fortunate in his eulogists. The picture drawn
of him by his friend, Lord Jeffrey, must rank as one of the finest ever
produced, as portrait and tribute combined. That it is a discriminating
statement, aitho so eulogistic, may well be accepted, since numerous
contributory proofs are given by others of Watt's personal characteristics.
Says Lord Jeffrey:
Independently of his great attainments in mechanics,
Mr. Watt was an extraordinary, and in many respects a wonderful man. Perhaps
no individual in his age possessed so much and such varied and exact
information—had read so much, or remembered what he had read so accurately
and well. He had infinite quickness of apprehension, a prodigious memory,
and a certain rectifying and methodising power of understanding, which
extracted something precious out of all that was presented to it. His stores
of miscellaneous knowledge were immense, and yet less astonishing than the
command he had at all times over them. It seemed as if every subject that
was casually started in conversation with him, had been that which he had
been last occupied in studying and exhausting; such was the copiousness, the
precision, and the admirable clearness of the information which he poured
out upon it without effort or hesitation. Nor was this promptitude and
compass of knowledge confined in any degree to the studies connected with
his ordinary pursuits. That he should have been minutely and extensively
skilled in chemistry and the arts, and in most of the branches of physical
science, might perhaps have been conjectured; but it could not have been
inferred from his usual occupations, and probably is not generally known,
that he was curiously learned -in many branches of antiquity, metaphysics,
medicine, and etymology, and perfectly at home in all the details of
architecture, music and law. He was well acquainted, too, with most of the
modern languages, and familiar with their most recent literature. Nor was it
at all extraordinary to hear the great mechanician and engineer detailing
and expounding, for hours together, the metaphysical theories of the German
logicians, or criticising the measures or the matter of the German poetry.
His astonishing memory was aided, no doubt, in a great
measure, by a still higher and rarer faculty—by his power of digesting and
arranging in its proper place all the information he received, and of
casting aside and rejecting, as it were instinctively, whatever was
worthless or immaterial. Every conception that was suggested to his mind
seemed instantly to take its place among its other rich furniture, and to be
condensed into the smallest and most convenient form. lie never appeared,
therefore, to be at all encumbered or perplexed with the verbiage of the
dull looks he perused, or the idle talk to which he listened; but to have at
once extracted, by a kind of intellectual alchemy, all that was worthy of
attention, and to have reduced it, for his own use, to its true value and to
its simplest form. And thus it often happened that a great deal more was
learned from his brief and vigorous account of the theories and arguments of
tedious writers, than an ordinary student could ever have derived from the
most painful study of the originals, and that errors and absurdities became
manifest from the mere clearness and plainness of his statement of them,
which might have deluded and perplexed most of his hearers without that
invaluable assistance.
It is needless to say, that, with those vast resources,
his conversation was at all times rich and instructive in no ordinary
degree; but it was, if possible, still more pleasing than wise, and had all
the charms of familiarity, with all the substantial treasures of knowledge.
No man could be more social in his spirit, less assuming or fastidious in
his manners, or more kind and indulgent toward all who approached him. He
rather liked to talk, at least in his latter years, but though he took a
considerable share of the conversation, he rarely suggested the topics on
which it was to turn, but readily and quietly took up whatever was presented
by those around him, and astonished the idle and barren propounders of an
ordinary theme, by the treasures which he drew from the mine they had
inconsciously opened. lie generally seemed, indeed, to have no choice or
predilection for one subject of discourse rather than another; but allowed
his mind, like a great cyclopedia, to be opened at any letter his associates
might choose to turn up, and only endeavour to select, from his
inexhaustible stores, what might be best adapted to the taste of his present
hearers. As to their capacity he gave himself no trouble; and, indeed, such
was his singular talent for making all things plain, clear, and
intelligible, that scarcely any one could be aware of such a deficiency in
his presence. His talk, too, though overflowing with information, had no
resemblance to lecturing or solemn discoursing, but, on the contrary, was
full of colloquial spirit and pleasantry. He had a certain quiet and grave
humour, which ran through most of his conversation, and a vein of temperate
jocularity, which gave infinite zest and effect to the condensed and
inexhaustible information which formed its main staple and characteristic.
There was a little air of affected testiness, and a tone of pretended rebuke
and contradiction, with which he used to address his younger friends, that
was always felt by them as an endearing mark of his kindness and
familiarity, and prized accordingly, far beyond all the solemn compliments
that ever proceeded from the lips of authority. His voice was deep and
powerful, although he commonly spoke in a low and somewhat monotonous tone,
which harmonised admirably with the weight and brevity of his observations,
and set off to the greatest advantage the pleasant anecdotes, which he
delivered with the same grave brow, and the same calm smile playing soberly
on his lips. There was nothing of effort indeed, or impatience, any more
than pride or levity, in his demeanour; and there was a finer expression of
reposing strength, and mild self-possession in his manner, than we ever
recollect to have met with in any other person. He had in his character the
utmost abhorrence for all sorts of forwardness, parade and pretensions; and,
indeed, never failed to put all such impostures out of countenance, by the
manly plainness and honest intrepidity of his language and deportment.
In his temper and dispositions he was-not only kind and
affectionate, but generous, and considerate of the feelings of all around
him; and gave the most liberal assistance and encouragement to all young
persons who showed any indications of talent, or applied to him for
patronage or advice. His health, which was delicate from his youth upwards,
seemed to become firmer as he advanced in years; and he preserved, up almost
to the last moment of his existence, not only the full command of his
extraordinary intellect, but all the alacrity of spirit, and the social
gaiety, which had illumined his happiest days. His friends in this part of
the country never saw him more full of intellectual vigour and colloquial
animation, never more delightful or more instructive, than in his last visit
to Scotland in the autumn of 1817. Indeed, it was after that time that he
applied himself, with all the ardour of early life, to the invention of a
machine for mechanically copying all sorts of sculpture and statuary; and
distributed among his friends some of its earliest performances, as the
productions of a young artist just entering on his eighty-third year.
All men of learning and science were his cordial
friends; and such was the influence of his mild character and perfect
fairness and liberality, even upon the pretenders to these accomplishments,
that he lived to disarm even envy itself, and died, we verily believe,
without a single enemy.
Professor Robison, the most intimate friend of his
youth, records that:
When to the superiority of knowledge in his own line,
which every man confessed, there was joined the naïve simplicity and candour
of his character, it is no wonder that the attachment of his acquaintances
was so strong. I have seen something of the world and I am obliged to say
that I never saw such another instance of general and cordial attachment to
a person whom all acknowledged to be their superior. But this superiority
was concealed under the most amiable candour, and liberal allowance of merit
to every man. Mr. Watt was the first to ascribe to the ingenuity of a friend
things which were very often nothing but his own surmises followed out and
embodied by another. I am well entitled to say this, and have often
experienced it in my own case.
This potent commander of the elements, this abridger of
time and space, this magician, whose cloudy machinery has produced a change
in the world, the effects of which, extraordinary as they are, are perhaps
only now beginning to be felt—was not only the most profound man of science,
the most successful combiner of powers, and combiner of numbers, as adapted
to practical purposes— was not only one of the most generally well-informed,
but one of the best and kindest of human beings. There he stood, surrounded
by the little band of northern literati, men not less tenacious, generally
speaking, of their own opinions, than the national regiments are supposed to
be jealous of the high character they have won upon service. Methinks I yet
see and hear what I shall never see or hear again. The alert, kind,
benevolent old man had his attention alive to every one's question, his
information at every one's command. His talents and fancy overflowed on
every subject. One gentleman was a deep philologist, he talked with him on
the origin of the alphabet as if he had been coeval with Cadmus; another, a
celebrated critic, you would have said the old man had studied political
economy and belles lettres all his life; of science it is unnecessary to
speak, it was his own distinguished walk.
Lord Brougham says:
We have been considering this eminent person as yet
only in his public capacity, as a benefactor of mankind by his fertile
genius and indomitable perseverance; and the best portraiture of his
intellectual character was to be found in the description of his
attainments. it is, however, proper to survey him also in private life. He
was unexceptionable in all its relations; and as his activity was
unmeasured, and his taste anything rather than fastidious, lie both was
master of every variety of knowledge, and was tolerant of discussion on
subjects of very subordinate importance compared with those on which he most
excelled. Not only all the sciences from the mathematics and astronomy, down
to botany, received his diligent attention, but he was tolerably read in the
lighter kinds of literature, delighting in poetry and other works of
fiction, full of the stores of ancient literature, and readily giving
himself up to the critical disquisitions of commentators, and to discussion
on the fancies of etymology. His manners were most attractive from their
perfect nature and simplicity. His conversation was rich in the measure
which such stores and such easy taste might lead us to expect, and it
astonished all listeners with its admirable precision, with the
extraordinary memory it displayed, with the distinctness it seemed to have,
as if his mind had separate niches for keeping each particular, and with its
complete rejection of all worthless and superfluous matter, as if the same
mind had some fine machine for acting like a fan, casting off the chaff and
the husk. But it had besides a peculiar charm from the pleasure he took in
conveying information where he was peculiarly able to give it, and in
joining with entire candor whatever discussion happened to arise. Even upon
matters on which he was entitled to pronounce with absolute authority, he
never laid down the law, but spoke like any other partaker of the
conversation. I had the happiness of knowing Mr. Watt for many years, in the
intercourse of private life; and I will take upon me to bear a testimony, in
which all who had that gratification I am sure will join, that they who only
knew his public merit, prodigious as that was, knew but half his worth.
Those who were admitted to his society will readily allow that anything more
pure, more candid, more simple, more scrupulously loving of justice, than
the whole habits of his life and conversation proved him to be, was never
known in society.
The descriptions given by Lords Brougham, Jeffrey, the
genial Sir Walter, and others, of Watt's universality of knowledge and his
charm in discourse recall Canterbury's exordium:
Hear him but reason in divinity And, all-admiring,
with an inward wish consumed, You would desire the king were made a
prelate; Hear him debate of commonwealth affairs, You would say—it
bath been all in all his study: List his discourse of war, and you shall
hear A fearful battle rendered you in music. Turn him to any cause of
policy, The Gordian knot of it he will unloose Familiar as his garter;
that, when he speaks, The air, a chartered libertine, is still, And
the mute wonder lurketh in men's ears To steal his sweet and honeyed
sentences.
If Watt fell somewhat short of this, so no doubt did
the king so greatly extolled, and much more so, probably, than the versatile
Watt,
Dr. Black, the discoverer of latent heat, upon his
death-bed, hears that the Watt patent has been sustained, and is for the
time restored again to interest in life. He whispers that he "could not help
rejoicing at anything that benefited Jamie Watt."
The Earl of Liverpool, prime minister, stated that Watt
was remarkable for the simplicity of his character, the modesty of his
nature, the absence of anything like presumption and ostentation, the
unwillingness to obtrude himself, not only upon the great and powerful, but
even on those of the scientific world to which he belonged. A more excellent
and amiable man in all the relations of life I believe never existed.
There can be no question that we have for our example,
in the man Watt, a nature cast in the finest mold, seemingly composed of
every creature's best. Transcendent as were his abilities as inventor and
discoverer, we are persuaded that our readers will feel that his qualities
as a man in all the relations of life were not less so, nor less worthy of
record. His supreme abilities we can neither acquire nor emulate. These are
individual and ended with him. But his virtues and charms as our fellow-man
still shine steadily upon our paths and will shine upon those of our
successors for ages to come, we trust not without leading us and them to
tread some part of the way toward the acquisition of such qualities as
enabled the friend of James Watt to declare his belief that a more excellent
and amiable man in all the relations of life "never existed." A nobler
tribute was never paid by man to man, yet was it not undeserved.
So passes Jamie Watt, the man, from view—a man who
attracted, delighted, impressed, instructed and made lifelong friends of his
fellows, to a degree unsurpassed, perhaps unequalled.
"His life was gentle, and the elements "So mixed in
him that Nature might stand up "And say to all the world, 'This was a
man." |